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Thomas Hide and Edward De Carle formed a partnership in 1857. They had both been running their own businesses in Melbourne for several years beforehand. They founded a Grocery Wine and Spirit merchant's business on Elizabeth Street, near Bourke street, which lasted until 1861. Their business also included a land and estate agency.

For information about De Carle and his history, see his own narrative under 'E. De Carle & Co., Melbourne" and "E. De Carle & Co., Dunedin'.

Thomas Hide is less well known than his partner, and Gardner could only say that he was 'an Englishman, and more of a storeman or salesman than a smart business man like his partner, and that after severing his connection with Mr. De Carle he went into business for himself.' The first mention of Thomas Hide in Melbourne directories was in 1853, when Hide and Co., auctioneers of 15 Bourke Street East appeared in the New Quarterly Melbourne Directory. In July of the same year an advertisement appeared in the Argus, stating that 'Thomas Hide begs most respectfully to inform his Adelaide and Melbourne friends and the public generally, that he has opened a General Store, No: 11 Bourke-street, adjoining Messers. Symons and Perry's auction-rooms, where he intends to sell all descriptions of goods, wholesale and retail, on the small profit and quick return principle, for ready money,' (Argus, Saturday 2 July 1853, p.9) In 1855 Hide was at 41 Swanston Street. He kept the address until 1856, but in that year he became a Wholesale Grocer. In 1857 he moved to 118 Elizabeth Street, advertising himself as a Provision Merchant shortly before his partnership before De Carle began. Gardner states that he re-opened his own business after the partnership with De Carle ended.

Hide and De Carle issued a total of 16 penny and half penny tokens, eight in 1857 and eight in 1858. All the tokens were struck by Heaton and Sons of Birmingham.

References:Gardner, F. (1911). 'Trade Tokens and the Firms who Issued Them', The Australian Storekeepers and Traders Journal, 31 August, p. 20. (photocopy)Gardner, F (1910). 'Trade Tokens and the Firms who Issued Them', The Australian Storekeepers and Traders Journal, 31 May, p.10.Melbourne directories from the collection of the State Library of Victoria, 1853-1859.Advertisement, The Argus, Saturday 2 July 1853, p.9.Sharples, J. (1993). 'Catalogue of Victorian Trade Tokens' in Journal of the Numismatic Association of Australia, Vol. 7, December, pp. 36-40.See also records for 'E. De Carle & Co.'